The Querechos were a
Native American people.
In 1541 the Spanish conquistador
Francisco Vásquez de Coronado and his army journeyed east from the
Rio Grande
The Rio Grande ( and ), known in Mexico as the Río Bravo del Norte or simply the Río Bravo, is one of the principal rivers (along with the Colorado River) in the southwestern United States and in northern Mexico.
The length of the Rio ...
Valley in search of a rich land called
Quivira. Passing through what would later be the panhandle of
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
he met a people he called the Querechos.
This was the first known venture of Europeans across the
Great Plains of the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...
. Coronado and his chroniclers were the first Europeans to describe the buffalo-hunting nomads of the Plains. The Querechos were
Apache Indians.
Meeting the Querecho
Coronado and his army found a Querecho settlement of about 200 "houses" on the
Llano Estacado
The Llano Estacado (), sometimes translated into English as the Staked Plains, is a region in the Southwestern United States that encompasses parts of eastern New Mexico and northwestern Texas. One of the largest mesas or tablelands on the North A ...
of the Texas Panhandle and adjacent
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe, New Mexico, Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque, New Mexico, Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Albuquerque metropolitan area, Tiguex
, Offi ...
. On the Llano they also saw vast herds of buffalo or
bison
Bison are large bovines in the genus ''Bison'' (Greek: "wild ox" (bison)) within the tribe Bovini. Two extant and numerous extinct species are recognised.
Of the two surviving species, the American bison, ''B. bison'', found only in North ...
. According to members of Coronado’s expedition, the Querechos lived "in tents made of the tanned skins of the cows (bison). They travel around near the cows killing them for food....They travel like the Arabs, with their tents and troops of dogs loaded with poles...these people eat raw flesh and drink blood. They do not eat human flesh. They are a kind people and not cruel. They are faithful friends. They are able to make themselves very well understood by means of signs. They dry the flesh in the sun, cutting it thin like a leaf, and when dry they grind it like meal to keep it and make a sort of sea soup of it to eat....They season it with fat, which they always try to secure when they kill a cow. They empty a large gut and fill it with blood, and carry this around the neck to drink when they are thirsty."
This brief account describes many typical features of
Plains Indians
Plains Indians or Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies are the Native American tribes and First Nation band governments who have historically lived on the Interior Plains (the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies) o ...
culture: skin
tipis,
travois pulled by dogs, sign language,
jerky (food), and
pemmican. In 1581, Spanish explorers of
the Chamuscado and Rodriguez Expedition had another meeting with the Querechos. They found a large "rancheria" of 400 warriors on the
Pecos River. probably near present-day
Santa Rosa, New Mexico. The Spanish were especially interested in the Indian dogs which pulled
travois with all their belongings, The Indians told the Spaniards that the bison herds were two days to the east and were "as numerous as grass in the fields."
In 1565 Francisco de Ibarra met a bison-hunting people he called Querechos near
Casas Grandes
Casas Grandes (Spanish for ''Great Houses''; also known as Paquimé) is a prehistoric archaeological site in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua. Construction of the site is attributed to the Mogollon culture. Casas Grandes has been design ...
,
Mexico
Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...
, hundreds of miles from where Coronado had visited them. There were about 300 men and their "attractive" women and children visiting the area, probably on a trading mission. They said that large bison herds could be found four days journey to the North. This meeting indicates that the Querechos were far ranging even before they acquired horses.
In 1583, the explorer
Antonio de Espejo
Antonio de Espejo (1540–1585) was a Spanish explorer who led an expedition into New Mexico and Arizona in 1582–83.pg 189 - The expedition created interest in establishing a Spanish colony among the Pueblo Indians of the Rio Grande vall ...
met Querechos in the mountains near
Acoma who traded salt, game, and deerskins to the townspeople in exchange for cotton blankets. He described them as warlike and numerous. These were the people later called
Navajos, related to the Apache.
Who Were the Querecho?
Authorities agree that the Querechos were Apache and Navajo Indians. The Apache were newcomers to Texas, having arrived on the Llano Estacado perhaps less than 100 years before the Spanish visited them there. A village farming culture in the Texas Panhandle, the
Antelope Creek Phase, disappeared about 1450. The reason for its disappearance may have been displacement by the Apache or the onset of a dryer climatic phase. By the time of Coronado it appears that the Apache were the dominant people over a wide area of the Great Plains extending north from the Llano Estacado to
Nebraska
Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the so ...
. (See
Dismal River culture
The Dismal River culture refers to a set of cultural attributes first seen in the Dismal River area of Nebraska in the 1930s by archaeologists William Duncan Strong, Waldo Rudolph Wedel and A. T. Hill. Also known as Dismal River aspect and Dismal ...
)
[Hammond and Rey, 224]
The word Querecho soon passed out of usage, replaced by other names by which the Apache and Navajo would be called by the Spanish in the centuries to come.
References
External links
Vaquero Indians Texas State Historical Association
{{authority control
Native American tribes in Texas
Apache tribes
Plains tribes